This copy is for your personal non-commercial use only. To order presentation-ready copies of Toronto Star content for distribution to colleagues, clients or customers, or inquire about permissions/licensing, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com

Neither unions nor employers support regulation by Ontario College of Trades

The fledgling Ontario College of Trades appears to be on the ropes with yet another large trades union pulling out its support for the regulatory body. Employers don&rsquo;t like it either.

By Richard J. BrennanQueen’s Park Bureau

Fri., Dec. 28, 2012

The troubled Ontario College of Trades has been dealt yet another setback with North America’s largest labourers union’s decision to turn its back on the new governing body.

The college, which regulates and promotes skilled trades, had been fending off opposition from a mostly employer-backed Stop the Trades Tax campaign, but the move by the Lroabourers’ International Union of North America (LIUNA) to withdraw its support is considered a major blow.

LIUNA has joined the chorus of voices opposed to the college’s approach to governing the trades, but in particular the levy on tradespeople and employers.

“While LIUNA was initially supportive (of the college) and optimistic about the potential for the college to help its members and members of other construction sector unions to raise the profile of skilled trades, we now find it difficult to support the college’s overall direction,” LIUNA director John Mandarino stated in a letter to the college earlier this month.

“Rather than giving us a stronger voice on regulatory changes affecting the construction industry, we fear that the college is becoming an added layer of bureaucracy that no longer accurately represents the skilled trades in Ontario, as it was supposed to do,” he further stated.

The college, first of its kind in North America, was to officially sign up Ontario members from Ontario 157 trades on Jan. 1, but that has now been delayed until April while officials try to sort out some of the concerns, and sit down with LIUNA representatives.

The self-regulating college, with a budget of $20 million a year, would be similar to those for doctors, teachers and lawyers.

If all 700,000 skilled trades workers joined the College of Trades it would be the largest of the province’s 45 regulatory colleges. Starting off, membership will be mandatory for only the 150,000 who work in the 22 trades in which certification is compulsory, such as electricians, auto mechanics and sheet metal workers.

The college, which will have enforcement and disciplinary powers, will offer the public a place to turn to complain about service, search for a local tradesperson, or find out whether a contractor has ever been disciplined for an infraction.

Ron Johnson, chair of the college’s board of governors and deputy director of the Interior Systems Contractors’ Association and its training centre in Woodbridge, said the problem is there are employers out there who don’t want any kind of oversight interfering with the way the way they do business. He further insisted that the majority of those working in the trades favour the college.

“I think there are certain organizations out there that benefit from a lack of enforcement for certification and training standards,” Johnson, a former Tory MPP, told the Star.

“There is also a feeling, and it is a wrong feeling, that the college is going to require all trades to be compulsory or certified and it is certainly not true,” he added.

Johnson said the “elephant in the room” is that some employers don’t want to see any more compulsory trades, fearing that would drive up the cost of wages and therefore the cost of construction.

“They are opposed to the college because under the college’s mandate … there is a provision that would allow a trade to apply to become compulsory. They don’t want that,” he said, adding he would be meeting with LIUNA in the new year to discuss its concerns.

The annual college fees range from $60 per apprentice and tradesperson up to $120 per journeyperson (certified tradesperson) and employer. However, joining the college is voluntary for employers.

Sean Reid, chair of the Stop the Trades Tax campaign, said the college is providing little more than a new level of bureaucracy and tax for the trades industries “without actually bringing much value back to tradespeople in the province.”

“The last thing we need to do to attract tradespeople into our industry is to attach new taxes and new bureaucracy to the industry … but unfortunately that’s what the government is doing,” said Reid, chair of the Ontario Construction Employers’ Coalition, representing 31 organizations and some 130,000 workers who oppose the college.

More from the Toronto Star & Partners

LOADING

Copyright owned or licensed by Toronto Star Newspapers Limited. All rights reserved. Republication or distribution of this content is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Toronto Star Newspapers Limited and/or its licensors. To order copies of Toronto Star articles, please go to: www.TorontoStarReprints.com